The Dutch post-Impressionist painter Vincent van Gogh is one of the most influential painters in western art. His series of still life sunflowers are known around the world today, but during his lifetime in the 1800s he lived in poverty, selling incredibly little of his work, some say just one painting, and suffered several serious breakdowns. One of his most famous paintings - The Starry Night - is said to be the view from his room in a French psychiatric hospital where he’d admitted himself shortly after severing his own left ear. This programme looks at the man behind these iconic paintings, explores how and why he became a painter and picks apart the various theories around his death from a gunshot wound at the age of just 37.Joining Bridget Kendall to discuss van Gogh’s life and work are Louis van Tilborgh, Senior Researcher at the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam and Professor of Art History at the University of Amsterdam, van Gogh biographer and co-author of van Gogh: The Life, Steven Naifeh, and British art historian Lucrezia Walker.Photo: Self-Portrait by Vincent van Gogh (Getty Images)

Mark Twain, born Samuel Langhorne Clemens, was known for his piercing wit, irreverent satire and social commentary. Leaving school early following the death of his father, he lived many lives in one: spending time as a journalist, steamboat pilot and world traveller, suffering significant personal and financial losses. These are just some of the experiences that would feed into his novels, articles, short stories, essays and the thousands of letters that are still being unearthed today. Best known for his book Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, which tells the story of a rebellious young boy called Huck floating down the Mississippi River with a runaway slave called Jim, Twain developed a style that led to him being credited as "the father of American literature". The work, like so much of Twain's other writing, tackles serious social issues and continues to be shrouded in controversy to this day. Bridget Kendall discusses his life and works with Twain scholars Shelley Fisher Fiskin, Thomas Smith, Jocelyn Chadwick and Mark Dawidziak.(Photo: Mark Twain (Donaldson Collection. Credit: Getty Images)

The Hungarian obstetrician Ignaz Semmelweis, born 200 years ago this month, saved the lives of hundreds, possibly thousands, of new mothers with his forward-looking ideas about hospital hygiene. He insisted that junior doctors working for him wash their hands in chlorinated lime solution before examining expectant mothers. This simple procedure reduced mortality by something like 90 per cent at the Vienna maternity ward that he was in charge of. Many more deaths could have been prevented had other physicians followed his advice without delay. So why did many in the medical profession resist not just Semmelweis's findings but also similar ideas of his fellow hygiene pioneers, such as Joseph Lister? Quentin Cooper discusses the beginnings of surgical cleanliness with Dr. Sonia Horn from Vienna University, Dr. Andrew Cunningham from Cambridge University and Prof. Michael Worboys from the University of Manchester.Photo: presurgery sanitization. (PeopleImages/Getty Images)

Try and imagine a world without numbers. Telling people how many siblings you have, counting your wages or organising to meet a friend at a certain time would all be much more difficult. If you’re reading this on a digital screen, even these words are produced through a series of zero and one symbols. We take them so much for granted yet some cultures don’t count and some languages don’t have the words or symbols for numbers. This programme looks at when and why humans first started start to count, where the symbols many of us use today originate from and when concepts like zero and infinity came about. Joining Bridget Kendall to explore the history of numbers and counting are anthropological linguist Caleb Everett from the University of Miami, writer and historian of mathematics Tomoko Kitagawa, and Emeritus Professor of Mathematics at Warwick University in the UK, Ian Stewart.Photo: An abacus on a table.(CaoChunhai//Getty Images)

William Blake is now one of England’s best-loved poets and artists, associated with the well-known poem “The Tyger” and the hymn “Jerusalem”, regularly coined England’s unofficial national anthem. But in his time he was an eighteenth century radical visionary who challenged the social order as well as political and religious orthodoxy at every turn. He was even tried for sedition. Rajan Datar discusses his life, works and remarkable legacy with Blake experts Dr. Linda Freedman, Dr. Susan Matthews, Prof. Jason Whittaker and artist Michael Phillips.Photo: 'Newton' by William Blake (Bettmann Collection)

In many countries, the word 'Fulbrighter' has become almost synonymous with US-sponsored scholarships. But what about the man whose idea it was to set up this international scholar exchange programme over 70 years ago: how did J. William Fulbright convince his fellow Senators to support this novel concept? After all, the aims of the programme were nothing if not ambitious: "the achievement in international affairs of a regime more civilized, rational and humane than the empty system of power of the past".To discuss the history of the Fulbright programme, Bridget Kendall is joined by Fulbright's biographer Randall Woods, Professor of History at the University of Arkansas; Joan Dassin, Professor of International Education and Development at Brandeis University in Massachusetts; and two recent Fulbright scholarship recipients: language teaching specialist Vitoria Prochet from Brazil and human rights activist from Afghanistan Nilofar Sakhi.Historic recordings of Fulbright speeches used in the programme courtesy of Special Collections, University of Arkansas.Photo: William Fulbright (Getty/Corbis Historical)

The fabled city of Timbuktu is a curiosity. To 16th century Muslim scholars, it was the cosmopolitan hub of Islamic learning in West Africa; to European explorers 300 years later, it was a place of mystery, whose name remains synonymous with being at the end of the Earth. Most recently, in 2013, Timbuktu was at the centre of the world's attention again, after Islamist militants threatened thousands of valuable historic manuscripts stored in the city's famous libraries. Believed to be the richest person in history, it was Mansa Musa - the emperor of the vast Mali Empire - who first developed the desert settlement into a place of intellectual debate in the 1300s. The golden age of Islamic learning he began still survives today. Joining Bridget Kendall to discuss the importance of Timbuktu in Islamic history are Dr. Gus Casely-Hayford, director of the Smithsonian National Museum of African Art in Washington, D.C., who has recently published a Ladybird Expert book about the city; Dr. Susana Molins-Lliteras, a researcher at the Tombouctou Manuscripts Project and postdoctoral fellow at the Department of Historical Studies, University of Cape Town; and Dr. Lansiné Kaba, Professor of History and Thomas M. Kerr Distinguished Career Professor at Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar.Photo: Sankore Mosque in Timbuktu, Mali (Getty Images)

What’s the secret to the 300 year-old success of the piano, an instrument that was hardly a huge hit when it was invented around the turn of the 18th century?Perhaps it’s the ability of the instrument to convey a vast range of styles from singing melodies to percussive rhythms, and from classical music to jazz, rock and pop. With the help of musical examples, Bridget Kendall and guests will explore how the piano has inspired music from composers on every continent.Joining Bridget will be the historic keyboard specialist Dr Elena Vorotko from the Royal Academy of Music in London, pianist and author Professor Kenneth Hamilton from the University of Cardiff, and the writer Stuart Isacoff in New York.Photo: Piano keys (Getty Images)

Simone de Beauvoir was a French philosopher and writer whose work exploring what it is to be a woman shaped feminist thinking today. A pioneering intellectual, she used her existential ideas around freedom and responsibility to shape her life, literature and politics. Rajan Datar discusses her life and work with writers Claudine Monteil and Lisa Appignanesi, and philosopher Tove Pettersen.Photo: Simone de Beauvoir (Getty Images)

Famous for her lovers and satirised for her colourful personal life, Catherine the Great was in many ways one of Russia’s most progressive and moderate rulers, modernising 18th century Russia, improving educational standards and creating a flourishing arts and literature scene. But she also turned Russia into the biggest Empire on earth since the Roman Empire, which included the annexation of Crimea. So how far has her imperial mind set influenced Russia’s modern rulers, like President Putin? Joining Bridget Kendall to discuss the life and legacy of Catherine II of Russia, is Professor Andrei Zorin, cultural historian and Chair of Russian at the University of Oxford, Simon Dixon, Professor of Russian History at University College London and author of the biography “Catherine the Great”’ and Dr Viktoria Ivleva, who specialises in Catherine’s role as a woman ruler and her use of uniform and costume.Photo: Equestrian Portrait of Catherine II. Oil on canvas by Vigilius Eriksen, Denmark. After 1762 (The State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg)